Thursday, July 19, 2012

June 18, 2012

Hola Familia Mia,

Well like always I truly loved the letters and the messages this week. All of them seemed so positive and happy and exciting. I love to hear that from you guys! Congratulations on performing music camp so well little girls! I always loved watching you guys dance and sing.  As for me, things are going awesome here! I seriously am having such a great time here in Apollo Beach. We had a couple miracles this week and we just started a couple more sweet things so I will just get started. Lightning responses, Carlee this week I was able to have the delicacy known as Chicharrones. In other words pig skin. but this was not deep fried nor very delicate. Actually it is straight up soft chewy pig skin with all the fat in the world still attached to it, and I happened to be Mr Lucky that night and scored the box with the most in it. I was able to eat about 7 tacos worth of these things and I had barely dented the pile. (as a mexican you just use tortillas as your fork and spoon and knife, so you tear out a chunk of tortilla and use it to grab a chunk of meat and beans and rice so just a hint when I get back home dont judge me for manners! hahaha) so 7 tacos means 7 tortillas broken into chunks with a big ol pig skin drippin with grease and juices in the middle. Not the worst but definitley not the best. As for the pizza mom yes we finished it well and got wings for afterwards. That puts me into another thing, I am gaining weight and size again. due to the very broad intelligence of Elder Shields when it comes to workouts and supplements and such.  He is now leading me in a full on charge for 200 if not 225. We just got to start going to a gym due to the English Elders who allow us to be their "buddies" so we can get in. Its part of what they payed for. Today I did 215 on decline bench by 5 with 4 negatives! oh yea. I am beat let me tell ya. Also my comp from the mtc that went home is coming back out this next transfer and we hope to train him. So a tripleship in a house of about 20 by 20? Should be fun. Now as for spiritual things or those things that actually matter. We are having a baptism this Saturday! His name is Samuel Lopez and he is from Puerto Rico and he is about as buff and thick as dad and wears the same type of clothes and everything. He is however a little younger. The funny thing is is that we met him last Sunday and committed him to baptism after one lesson. He said yes and then bought a whole sunday getup and he does everything we tell him to. Just fell right into our hands from out of nowhere! So we are super pumped about him! Oh to go along with the whole size thing, the members here are really starting to love us and because they love us they ask us to come over and eat all the time now! Last night we had HUGE turkey legs and Mac and Cheese and mole and a bunch of other stuff! Great for the protein intake eh? hahaha But the cool thing is that the family we ate with is less active and owns a store and now they like us so we have a family night with them this week and everytime we come she lets us take anything we want from the store. pretty cool stuff. As for that other baptismal date, it hasn't been set because apparently the girl is going through a nervous breakdown and never is home now. So we hope she took her chill pills this week hahaha. No we really love her its just hard. We did a ton of service and we got to hang out with all the members as we painted a whole house in one day. Then afterwards two of the hermanos took us out to eat at a chinese restaurant which was super good. So we have been doing pretty good and we are only getting better. Even english classes are going very well. we have two returning people and one brought his two kids last time. We kinda hope to baptize him and his family. So we are doing great and I love being here!  So keep it swell and write back all the adventures. I love you guys because you are the best family!
Love, ELDER OLIVER 

Monday, July 2, 2012

June 11, 2012

Hola familia!
Well this week was yet again another great one with many adventures and some great growing experiences. But first I thought I would deal with some business.  I have been using a little card money because some of the companions I have had as of late don’t know how to use money and their families are not so well off so I try to help them out a little here and there and I have bought myself a couple things. I had to buy new running/sport shoes because my others were destroyed and luckily at a Ross I found some sweet Nikes that were 100 but I got them for 35. Like these are like top of the line running shoes! So the Lord definitely provided. Then I had to kinda restock when I got here because they really had nothing so I bought some soap and a couple necessities and I got Elder Shields a birthday gift because no one has ever really celebrated his birthday. So I got him a little something.
Also I had to pay to go to a walk-in clinic so that was like another 25 bucks because I had an infection on my face for the first 2 weeks I was here and all the doctor told me was it was Herpes and that I needed Bwister hoff (Chinese doctor) ((blister off is what he meant to say)) he wouldn’t even give me anything! Blister off is pretty much neosporin. At least it wasn’t staff or impetigo again though but it did make getting to know everyone fun as little kids said things like "I think there is a bug in your skin" or "what’s that big red thing on your face" or even the members "what happened to your face?" hahaha its all been pretty humbling and I have grown much hahaha. Also I don’t mean to be so demanding but I might need a new frame for the glasses if possible. I will send my hard-drive in soon so you guys can go through it and see all the other pictures I have. I will try to send it sometime this week because that has all the good stuff on it. Thanks for everything you guys do to keep me up. I truly appreciate it.
As for you guys it sounds like the fun begins. Awesome to hear that music camp is still going on and that you little girls get to do it. Enjoy every minute of it! Also Clay live up efy to as much as you can! In dads words it’s a microburst of wonder in every way. Use it wisely and don’t pass a minute because of fear! Cassie great to hear you have an awesome job.
As for this week. We actually ended up have really low numbers. We had a funeral and a viewing all Monday night and half of Tuesday so that cut into our time and then we had a special training in Tampa so all of Thursday was gone but that meant weekly planning on Friday so there goes most of Friday and then we had a couple of service opportunities. I got to ride the minny horse once again! hahahaha We did pretty good though and we even had a very less active but once very positive member show back up at church and he really participated and even helped fellowship a new guy that just showed up at church and asked us to teach him. He’s pretty cool and I think he just really wants to get baptized. He’s like a Puerto Rican guido, ripped an slicked back black hair with an Italian face. haha so the Lord is providing pretty well for us. Not to mention we had a serious talk with an investigator who we were going to drop but then she told us she wants to get baptized. SO yea things are looking up and we are excited to start going to town. Also luckily for us today we get to go to a restaurant owned by a member and eat a 28 inch 16 pound pizza for free because he wants to see if we can do it. Oh yea he is straight Italian so it should be delicious! I will tell you next week how it goes. Hhahaha We have a lot and the Lord is definitely watching over us. I love this work and Yes I love my companion Elder Sields we are like best friends, and there is only good things to come. I Love you and miss you all so much and hope the best for you this week!
LOVE,  ELDER OLIVER